


Pride and Prejudice and Puerile

by JanitorBot



Category: Rockman X | Mega Man X, Rockman | Mega Man - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Light-Hearted, Bless X for being empathetic, Bless Zero for being a translator, Combatdroid culture, Consensual Sex, Explicit Language, Explicit Sexual Content, Fluff, He is a certified Mean Girl, Human cussing, M/M, Not a lot of it but it's still there, Possible Trigger - Vile's Hinted Backstory, Vile is so salty oh my god, Which implied he worked for very bad humans who did bad things to minors, lots of cussing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-27
Updated: 2018-08-27
Packaged: 2019-07-03 09:12:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,587
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15815883
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JanitorBot/pseuds/JanitorBot
Summary: The other Hunters are eager to please and they hang on X’s word like he’s dropping some holy wisdom even when he’s saying something as mundane as wanting to go walk at a park. They might as well be ready to lay shock absorbers beneath X’s feet in case the blue android ever trips. It’s really pathetic.By virtue of being the First, X has spawned a social structure that puts himself on top.It makes Vile sick.In which X is fairly popular for a B-Hunter and Vile doesn't know how to function with emotions healthily like a normal person to the surprise of nobody.





	Pride and Prejudice and Puerile

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Robotic_meido](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Robotic_meido/gifts).



> This is a birthday commissioned fic for Robotic-Meido, who requested the following:  
> "Vile and X; consensual smut; light fic; Vile tops (lol)  
> Vile is sexy under his helmet (Rayum's fanart/interpretation). Also, can Vile eat or make spaghetti?"
> 
> I fulfilled 5.5 of those conditions. You'll see Meido, you'll see. 
> 
> This story takes place in an alternate universe where Vile is 68% of the reckless, wildcard asshole he actually is because my actual interpretation of Vile is incompatible with X unless it’s a dark, unhealthy relationship and that's not what this fic is about. 
> 
> Enjoy and happy birthday Meido!

Some giant mechaniloid in charge of a multi-level factory procession in the middle of the woods has gone Irregular.

It trampled its way out of the building it was born in, leaving the factory into a mountainous pile of brick and broken machinery, swinging its way through tall trees with its four arms. Each step can cause an earthquake.

The mission is to make sure it doesn’t reach Abel City.

The ranger unit that responded to the scene isn’t strong enough to take it down. Hunter Base tells them to keep it busy until back-up arrives.

Ten minutes later, back-up comes in a form of a manic violet combatdroid operating a giant powered exoskeleton. 

“Thanks for stalling it, betas!” Vile cackles. “Now get out of the way!”

In a span of three point six seconds, the Hunters in Vile’s way turn around, sees the humongous ride armor charging at their direction, panic, and scramble as far as possible like malfunctioning kukkus.

The rogue CE-21 doesn’t have a chance. It’s as tall as a three story building but it’s heavy, clunky, and doesn’t react fast enough. Vile dashes easily around its lumbering legs, pummeling at its knee joints until they weaken, seizing the limb and kicking in the thrusters high to tear them off violently. If Vile wanted to end this quick, he’d cock the good ol’ cannon and blast the mechaniloid’s processor off once its sufficiently crippled.

But that’ll be too quick.

Instead he hops, the entire weight of the ride armor landing squarely on the mech’s chest, caving it in. He hops a few more times for good measure, like a child on a trampoline, relishing the high pitched squeals of metal giving in, the crackling charge of electricity and power distributors failing, then finally makes one final leap in the air.

 _Then_ he fires his cannon right at the CE-21’s abdomen where its fuel tank should be.

The mech blows up, a perfect picture of smoldering black and fire, its smoking breath clouding the sky grey and dark.

“ _Vile to Base,”_ the violet warmachine transmissions. “ _Mech’s scrapped. Toldja didn’t need anyone else._ ”

Vile turns off the channel before the Navigator can nag him to return to base.

He wants to keep enjoying the view.

Vile’s not a Maverick Hunter. Vile isn’t rusting _anything_ but himself. It just so happens that the Hunters can provide him his much needed dosage of violence at a regular pace, which is so much better than standing around like a glorified bouncer back in Afristralia.

Besides, killing humans in the middle of nowhere isn’t interesting. They’re organic and they don’t always carry gunpowder, highly concentrated alcohol, or anything that can go boom, and Vile _needs_ something to blow up. Preferably, something to give him a chance to make it happen himself.

The Hunters always fight where there’s tons of structures that can fall along with parameters and stakes to make them a challenge.

Most importantly, they only fight Irregulars and Mavericks, and that’s a guarantee explosion.

Basically, the Maverick Hunters are not the worst group to ride with. Every successful mission that ends with a bang gets Vile a bunch of reploids congratulating him because even though they’re stupid at least they know brilliance when they see it. More hilariously, Abel City’s headlines and news cables would show Vile’s destruction and the warmachine can keep a tally of how many more buildings he can topple down, how many businesses he indirectly slagged, and it’s all a riot because they can’t do anything about it. Vile gets the job _done._

As long as he aims his cannon at the “right” targets, no one’s got a complaint on how he roasts them.

Which makes X the worst smelting thing that has ever happened to him.

 

* * *

 

The Maverick Hunters is developing a reputation of becoming some bizarre foster care. But instead of useless fetuses – or overgrown fetuses that _don’t_ have the excuse of being fresh from the gross hellhole called the human womb to be equally useless – Sigma takes in illegal, unregistered reploids who were meant to be one-man slaughter machines. 

The latest adoptee is Zero, who becomes one of the five point five reploids (because Spark Mandrill is too stupid be considered a complete reploid) Vile doesn’t outright hate just for being the new mysterious shiny thing who can actually fight worth a scrap.

Rather than Vile having to deal with nosy rookies asking inane questions about his construction background, it can be the Red Ripper’s turn.

It’s been interesting to see how long the new warbot can last dealing with the attention without itching to stab someone. Vile has spotted a couple times when it seems like Zero is going to, especially at Sigma when the Commander orders the red warbot to stay put in the back during patrol. 

A benefit of wearing a helmet is that no one can tell when Vile takes pictures of their reactions. Zero’s “How dare you not let me fight” face is Vile’s favorite next to Sigma’s “If I were a human, I’d be constipated” and Storm Eagle’s “I am so offended at your existence.”

Zero’s a ticking time bomb that Vile’s waiting to explode, to give Vile an excuse to crush someone who can put up a decent struggle. Before, Vile was waiting for the lit fuse between Flame Mammoth or Chill Penguin to reach the dynamite, but they’re taking way too long and Vile is getting bored of all this faux-civility everyone’s putting up. 

Then someone pinched the fuse and it sputters out.

“What the rust is that thing,” Vile says blankly.

Zero consistently lays against the farthest wall from the entrance of the Hunters Common Room, usually with a data pad in hand, but this time he’s got some bizarre boxy thing instead. It’s playing some music that Vile has never heard before and Zero has been staring at the black disc on the top twirling in circles like he’s watching clouds go by. A mindless drone.

“It is a phonograph, specifically a portable vinyl player,” the red warbot explains. “It plays music.”

“No rust. Why don’t you just download it and listen it from your archives like everyone else? Why have _that_ junk?” Vile gestures at the object flippantly.

Zero gazes back down at the phonograph again. “It sounds better. Digital recordings don’t capture the complete sound wave, but vinyl records have grooves carved into them that mirrors the original sound’s waveform. No information is lost and the output is more accurate.”

_The rust?_

As if sensing Vile’s shock, Zero shrugs – which also shocks Vile because shrugging? That’s a human gesture and where did the original, no-nonsense, human-affectations-are-whatever combatdroid gone to?

“I didn’t know you like music that much,” the violet warmachine recovers.

“I didn’t either,” Zero admits. “But X introduced it to me. It’s not bad. He gave me the phonograph too. He called it a ‘gift.’”

Then Zero does that thing on his lips, where the ends go up out of some contentment, and Vile is _not_ calling it a smile, not from Zero of all combat robots because that’s already too smelting weird.

If it was a one-time occurrence, it’s one thing. But the weird slag keeps happening over and over again, and while Vile can appreciate shake-ups in routine, the change of atmosphere that has suddenly infected Hunter Base is pissing him off.

First Zero calms down. Then Flame Mammoth stops messing with the lower-rankers and Chill Penguin somehow learned to stop squawking off into a rant every five minutes like he usually does. Even Sting Chameleon is actually walking around Base without camouflage on like the sniveling creep he is. 

It doesn’t take long for Vile to figure out that the everyone’s sudden personality switch is caused by the same person: X.

Vile’s impression of the First is underwhelming. The first time they spar, Vile curbstomped X completely that Vile almost pitied him if the other android wasn’t so fragging annoying. X is shorter, slower, and weaker than Vile and got a buster that shoots pathetic, low-powered yellow plasma. X is so weak that he acts as the distraction and rescue effort of the Elite Unit instead of a real Hunter. He worries too much and has a face that reminds Vile of the dancing boys that Zanetti bought.

Unlike the dancers, X doesn’t know when to keep out of other people’s business and shut up.

The Seventeenth Unit is summoned for another giant mechaniloid disaster down at Sector South-23. Vile isn’t allowed to use his ride armor, but he doesn’t need to. The takedown is quick but fun, the roads are nicely scarred and ruined, and Vile’s good mood vanishes when X opens his mouth.

“Vile, please be careful where you’re aiming your cannon,” the First says as he pulls a dumb, unconscious human underneath the debris caused by a rogue mechaniloid smashing through the side of a building. “You could have hurt someone.”

“Geez, what are you? A Hunter or a Navigator?” Vile scoffs. “Oh wait, you’re neither. You’re just a rookie so shut up.”

X wears a face that’s preparing to roll its eyes. “I’m not a rookie. I’ve passed the exams.”

Vile snaps his fingers. “Oh right, I remember now! I’d say congrats but you wound up in B-Class, which still means you’re not worth slag. Who took down the mech? That’s right, not _you_.”

“Power doesn’t mean anything if you’re using it irresponsibly,” X retorts.

“He’s right. You used more firepower than was needed to take down the mech,” adds Zero from the side. He slashes a giant piece of rubble with his beam saber. A panicky human climbs out from below, thanking the red warbot as it scampers off to the ambulance parked nearby. ”It’s inefficient use of energy.”

“Hey! The mech’s not moving anymore, is it?” Vile pipes back, irked.

“At the cost of unnecessary collateral,” cuts in familiar voice.

Vile turns around to see Sigma’s expressionless, blue marble eyes peering down at him. “’We’re the sword and shield for those who cannot protect themselves.’ If your actions bring more harm than good, then you’re no better than a Maverick. Clean up the act, Vile.”

The warmachine gawks. Before Sigma wouldn’t say anything about Vile’s methods with dealing against Mavericks – which is basically blow them up till kingdom come – but one comment from X and now everyone’s got a problem with it.

They’re _all_ siding with him!

If Vile can’t have fun, what was the point of leaving Afristralia in the first place? Sure blasting humans got outdated, but at least he could _freely_ blast them up back then.

X is getting cocky and the rest of the Hunters aren’t doing anything about it. They’re happy to put him on a pedestal and keep him there.

Well Vile’s not going to go along with it.

When the Elite Unit returns back to base, the violet warmachine strides up to X, shoulders and head curved forward enough to loom over the smaller android.

“Look, beta. You’re only here because Zero used to teach you and Sigma’s a disgusting suck-up. Don’t get cocky just because you’re in the Seventeenth. I’ve beaten you before in a one v one and I will _always_ beat you. You’re beneath me.”

Vile is aware of the subtlety and power in body language, how the humans he used to work with used them in full effect for intimidation. Any sensible human or reploid would shy away when a formidable being like Vile crowds them like this.

But X doesn’t back away to regain personal distance. He doesn’t even exhibit any visible sign of discomfort.

Instead he steps forward, coming even closer to the point that it’s _Vile’s_ turn to be uncomfortable by the lack of space between them. Another inch more and X’s chassis can be touching Vile’s.

“Vile, I want to get along with you,” X says earnestly. “If I offended you before, I didn’t mean to. Can we try being friends?”

A sharp current, something akin to firing his cannon but a bit slower, crackles somewhere between Vile’s compact tank and his core, and spread around like his power distributors are preparing for combat. It triggers Vile’s arms to raise up and shove X hard away from him.

“Sucking up to every robot that’s superior to you? So that’s how you got Zero and Sigma wrapped around your little finger,” the warmachine sneers, disgusted. “Typical.”

X is taken aback. “What? That’s not what I’m – “

“Get smelted, X.”

Vile knocks past, deliberately knocking the other android hard enough to stumble as he goes. 

 

* * *

 

It takes a couple of times of seeing X and feeling that same current for Vile to examine it a little more. It feels like a sharper version of annoyance, a deeper version of hatred, and together it makes Vile want to lash out like subroutine. 

It makes Vile want to shoot him.

But killing X isn’t allowed and Vile’s banned from the sparring room for a month for _almost_ killing X when they first fought (still rubbed acid over that, seriously, being temporarily banned for doing exactly what the room’s meant for? Sigma’s gone mad).

So he does this instead.

“Hey X.”

X turns around only to receive a hand chop right to his helmet. “Ach!”

“There was a bug on your head. You’re welcome,” Vile says lightly as the smaller android rubs the sore spot wordlessly.

X doesn’t say anything, just looks at Vile bewildered. The warmachine takes a secret photo.

The violet warmachine holds back a snicker as he passes by, continuing his way down the hallway.

_Loser._

It’s not beating X up to an inch of his life but it fulfills some part inside of Vile and it’s amusing to see X’s dumb face each time he hits him.

“There’s dust on your shoulders.” A punch.

“You’ve got a smudge on your leg.” A kick.

“Hey X, you’ve got something on your face – “

The blue android ducks the incoming slap and rubs his own face quickly.

“Thank you for telling me, Vile. I can take care of it myself,” X says a tad sardonically. 

After the first couple of times of hitting X under a variety of lame excuses, if Vile tries to get close over a certain speed, X would immediately dodge it and stalk away quickly, pretending nothing has happened.

So the B-hunter can develop some decent mobility. But that’s not enough to shake Vile off.

 

* * *

 

Vile actually likes the Hunters Common Room. It's technically meant for everyone but it’s not _._ It belongs to the A-Rank Hunters and when they come in, the undeserving clears out. It shows that the Maverick Hunters’ mediocre ranking system means something.

The purple warmachine hasn’t moved a step beyond the door of the Hunters Common Room, dumbfounded at what he’s witnessing.

“Elizabeth’s feelings for Darcy changed after she went to his estate. That strikes to me that she may be materialistic? Not to the degree that Lydia is of course.”  

“Hmm, that’s an interesting interpretation. I’ve read it as Elizabeth realizing that Darcy had a more compassionate side because of the servants’ praises for him, and _that’s_ why her feelings changed. What do you think, Zero?”

“I didn’t read the book. It held no tactical value to me. But from the discussion so far, I’m suspecting it can be both. If I was in a position of limited social maneuverability, I would be drawn towards the opportunity to compensate when it becomes available and Elizabeth doesn’t seem to be stupid. Also, it is natural for one’s assessment upon an enemy’s character to change after further recon.”

“What the rust,” Vile deadpans.

Every reploid holding a data pad – Launch Octopus, X, some unimportant low-rankers – look up at Vile from their gathered circle at the center of the room. Zero is at his usual spot on the wall, already facing the entrance and thus already acknowledged Vile’s presence from the beginning.

“This is a book club meeting. We’re discussing about Pride and Prejudice, a classic piece of literature with such exquisite writing,” Launch Octopus provides, whose presence Vile is still baffled by because why the smelt is the animaloid doing here at Hunter Base and not the bottom of the ocean? Doesn’t he have stupid pirouettes to practice?  

“Why.”

“Uh, it’s a good book?” some random magenta reploid pipes up unhelpfully.

“I mean _why_ are you extras having a smelting book club.”

Vile’s gaze finds X’s green eyes and he says snidely, “Let me guess. Your idea, X?”

“We’re just trying it out,” the blue android answers calmly. “People have been asking me about human-related questions and I thought it would be nice to host extracurricular activities outside of fighting.”

“We’re Hunters. Fighting is what we _do_.”

“Oh nothing’s wrong with being cultured, Vile,” Launch Octopus giggles. “We’re reploids! We’re not mindless brutes and we shouldn’t limit ourselves to our directives. That’ll make us no better than, well, mechs!”

Launch Octopus gives off a laugh – a “Ho ho ho ho!” - that reminds Vile of this obnoxious, rich human he once met long ago. Amazing, what a smeltturd.

“So your answer is to turn the common room into a rusting tea party.”

How is Vile going to enjoy his pastime of scaring off low-rankers off his territory if X insists turning it into a siss-fest?

“What’s tea?” a rookie asks another quietly in the background, who replies “look it up.” No one can see it but Vile rolls his eyes anyway.  

X stands up from his seat. “Hey Vile…”

The shorter android carefully walks through the circle of reploids, which he didn’t need to because they part for him like he’s robot Moses. “Would you like to join us?” he asks hesitatingly.

Vile is caught off-guard. “What?”

X is _still_ trying to play nice? How was Zero able to teach this idiot anything when he can’t seem to wise up?

The stupid robot in question offers a sheepish smile. “Who knows, maybe you’ll like it? You don’t know if you don’t try. How about you take a quick look?”

He offers Vile his data pad. Vile’s stunned enough to reach out for it.

Then his fingers brush against X’s and it jolts Vile into remembering himself.

The moment the small metal thing gets passes over to the purple warbot’s hands, he applies pressure at the tips of his fingers and the tablet snaps in half.

“Whoops, my bad,” the purple warmachine says dully as the pieces fall. “Guess I don’t know my own strength.”

Zero kicks off from the wall, ice blue eyes narrowing. “Vile,” the Red Ripper intones lowly and the entire room grows tense, though Launch Octopus raises two tentacles and rub them together, as if prepared to watch a show. The animaloid’s only missing an E-Tank.

“It’s just an accident,” X says hurriedly to the glaring red warbot who’s advancing closer and closer. When Zero gets close enough, X raises a placating hand on his former mentor’s shoulder. “What’s important is that no one’s got hurt. I can always get a new data pad.”

“Yeah Zero, it was an accident so don’t blow a gasket. Happens all the time,” Vile remarks lazily. “So why don’t you listen to X and stand down like the good dog you are?”

“Vile,” X hisses warningly and oh, irritation is a good look on the blue android.

“Oh come on X, what’s wrong with a bit of teasing between _friends_ , right?” Vile croons innocently, internally cackling at the entire scenario. “I thought you wanted to get along?”

He doesn’t think about what he does next.

The purple reploid reaches out and wraps an arm around X’s shoulders, tugging the smaller robot farther from Zero and closer to himself, cozying close. He positions his head low towards X’s aural cone and says, “I’m so _sorry_ if I offended you,” in all unapologetic sweetness.   

It takes everything to not outright laugh at Zero. The former berserker is flat out boring daggers into Vile, utterly unconvinced that it’s an accident because Zero’s actually smart even though he’s grown attached to someone as processor-broken as X.

Vile takes another hidden photo.

“Ohhhh myyyyy,” Launch Octopus enthuses with upturned eyes, drinking in the passive aggressive mood. “Aren’t you a popular one, X?”

 _Wow, way to kill it,_ Vile thinks unimpressed.

Speaking of X, it takes a moment for Vile to realize that his figurative robot shield isn’t moving and shifts his attention fully back to him.

X is frozen. His bright green eyes are staring at the area where Vile is touching him, head tilted with an expression that Vile doesn’t recognize.

It takes a cheerful chirp of his notification settings for Vile to learn that he’s taken a secret photo of X’s face without realizing it. 

The current is back again. It comes so strongly like a crashing wave, whiting out Vile’s mind for a split second and the warmachine had to snap his arm back away from X before he does something that’ll get him declared Maverick, like wrapping his hands around the other’s throat and snapping it.

“Vile…?”

“This is boring, I’m outta here,” Vile snaps with forced nonchalance to a perplexed X, turning heel and leaving the room.

_What the rust is going on?_

 

* * *

 

It once occurred to Vile that if he despises X so much he can just avoid him.

It also occurred to Vile that he’s not a fragging _coward_ and avoiding X is like admitting defeat.

Vile knows more than a couple reploids who loathes X (for once Flame Mammoth and Chill Penguin agrees on something; seems like X is an indirect miracle worker apparently), but they keep their mouths shut (which means it’s all up to Vile to openly protest against X’s existence).

Vile can think of several guesses why the most vocal and belligerent A-Ranks are keeping their distance from X, but the most likely reason may have to do with a very specific warbot that has knocked Sigma’s position of X’s number one fanboy.

X isn’t a student anymore, and yet Zero has somehow made it his directive to be by X’s side constantly during off-duty hours and rust, the clinginess is so gross, doesn’t he have any shame?

“You’re so anal,” Vile drawls one day to Zero when they’re sitting in the back of the Seventeenth Unit transport van together. “You used to make sense then X showed up and now you act like you _care_.” Gross. “So what if I smack him around a few times? He’s ranked B! If anything, I’m doing him a favor. He’s starting to get quicker on pedes, isn’t he? You used to be his teacher. You should appreciate it.”

Zero replies,” He’s stronger than you assess him to be.”

“What? Have you gone bolts?”

“X is strong enough to be gentle. If he wasn’t strong, he wouldn’t afford to risk to be vulnerable.”

Vile barks a laugh and crosses his arms behind his head. “What a load of slag. Did you get amnesia again when I wasn’t looking?”

“What do you mean?”

“I thoroughly handed X’s cables back to him. Seriously, that was the _easiest_ spar I’ve ever had. He can’t shoot for his life.”

“I won’t deny that his specs weren’t high when you fought him. But X has grown stronger and he’ll keep growing stronger. He has potential.”  

 “Wow, you sound like Sigma at his most annoying,” Vile derides. “If that’s the case, why are you always hovering over him like he’s going to break if you don’t watch?”

Zero falls quiet and Vile leans closer.

“You’re just spouting tar. If you really think X is anything more than a hatless mettaur, you wouldn’t be acting like you’re his smelting creator. Don’t you get tired of being X’s guard dog?”

“Don’t _you_ get tired of being a jackass?” Zero shots back finally.

That actually catches Vile by pleasant surprise. “Well smelt me! I haven’t heard someone use that since before I joined the Hunters. Who’s been teaching you human swear words? Rust, do you even know what a jackass means?” Coming from Zero, it’s actually pretty funny instead of insulting.

“I don’t,” the Red Ripper admits unashamedly. “But I can get the gist of it. To answer your question, it was X. I asked him how he assesses you, and he cycled through ten different words before settling it to jackass. You should be proud,” Zero adds to Vile’s still form. “X doesn’t like human curses. He finds them vulgar and rarely uses them. For him to use one on you is an achievement.”

The van stops and Zero hops out, leaving Vile sputtering behind him.

X called Vile a jackass behind his back?

 _Who knew the oh-so-virtuous and saintly Father of All Reploids likes to talk smack behind other people’s back?_ Vile thinks with clenched fists. _Shows he’s not so above it all._

Unknowingly Zero has provided some valuable insight.

So X doesn’t like human cursing, does he? Thinks it’s vulgar, does he?

Well it’s too _fucking_ bad for him that Vile doesn’t care what X dislikes then.

 

* * *

 

It takes a maximum of twenty minutes for the average reploid to drain a full E-Tank straight so honestly the canteen spaces are worth slag. A fully operational vending machine in a hallway would be enough, but when Vile once asked Sigma about it, he got something something “human architect not knowing reploid anatomy” something something “good for sociability” something, what-rusting-ever.

What happens is that the Hunters, especially anyone B-Rank and lower, treat the canteen like a human cafeteria. They take their sweet time restoring their subtanks and chatting together.

Vile usually comes in, cuts the line because like rust he’s going to wait when he’s got better things to do, take his tank, and leaves.

This time he sees X surrounded by a couple Hunters and seriously, when are people going to wise up that beyond being the first android, X is as basic as a Nokia?

The android is currently twisting a metal utensil into some bizarre, mushy red thing in an aluminum container, which sits on a wrinkled, folded brown paper bag set on the table in front of him.

“Wait, so the long things are marinara?” asks a magenta Hunter peering over X’s shoulder curiously.

“The sauce is called marinara, Mac. The long things are noodles,” X explains cheerfully.

“I wish I can eat food. There’s so much of it and they look really interesting,” remarks another Hunter wistfully. “My model line didn’t come with the ability to taste since our designers didn’t find it necessary.”

“It might have been very expensive too,” X adds. “The ability to consume food requires more processes outside of the taste sense. Most reploids’ teeth are designed to appear like a human’s even though it can’t properly function like one. Also, there has to be some parts rearrangement to make room for a canal from the oral cavity to the fuel tank, and even that has its limits. For example, my compact tank isn’t purely a combustion-type so if I eat anything organic it takes time for my nanites to pull them apart and isolate the materials. Therefore, I’m limited to consuming only small portions at a time.”

“Why would you even want to eat food in the first place?” Vile saunters up to the blue android, whose previously good mood fades for something between neutral and wary. “It looks like someone cracked opened a human’s head over a bunch of worms.”

“It’s spaghetti,” says X patiently. “A friend of mine sent this to me. It may not be necessary for robots to eat food, but it’s another dimension to relate with humans better.”

“Well that’s _fucking_ stupid,” Vile declares.  

X’s smile drops.

 _Ding ding ding, one for Vile, zero for X,_ Vile inwardly cackles at both X’s reaction and the technically accurate pun. The upside of the conversation back in the van is that after being called out on it, Zero doesn’t stick to X as frequently, as if trying to prove a point.

Works for Vile, hah.

“’Fucking?’ What’s that?” the same magenta, visored reploid from earlier asks innocently.

“Don’t look it up!” X orders harshly and the surrounding Hunters jump at the uncharacteristic voice. The Father of All Reploids backtracks, stuttering, “I mean, if you look it up you’re not going to get the, uh, appropriate results, and it’s really complicated. Oh rust, I don’t have anything prepared for this…“

“You ignorant fools, it’s alright. I can explain,” Vile says insidiously, delighting at X’s paling face. “Fucking is when two humans - or two reploids if they’ve got the parts - take off their outer layers and get filthy –“

Vile’s vision disappears with a loud, squelching smack.

The purple warbot shuts up, stunned, as he feels something wet slide down on his actual face beneath his helmet.

His immediate vicinity has also fallen silent. Slowly, Vile wipes whatever is sticking on the front of his helmet and studies the mess. Red mush. He looks up and sees X whose arm in a swing-motion arc in midair.

The blue android looks as surprised as Vile feels.

“You fucking scum pumper!” Vile roars, activating combat mode. The surrounding reploids squeak and scramble away, making a wide circle around the two androids and the table. “Dipshit! Blue bastard! Eight-bit walking cunt!”

“You have quite the variety of human curses in your database,” X observes weakly. 

“Eat a trillion dicks, X, you threw your fucking crap on me!”

“I did and I’m sorry.”

The heartfelt apology mentally throws Vile off the curb.

X turns to a shaken reploid who has scurried to the side, trying to hide behind another reploid in fear. “As for your question earlier…I think it’ll be good to have a segment about that too. I recommend not doing any independent research into the subject, but ultimately that’s your decision. Now if you excuse me, I’m going to clean up my mess.”

X makes a movement to leave and Vile surges, “Hey, we’re not finished yet!”

Before he could reach out and grab X’s shoulder, Vile takes a step forward and sees his perspective flip upside down as he slips on the fallen spaghetti, resulting him to fall face first onto the table’s edge with a loud bonk before crashing on the ground. 

If it was quiet before, it’s graveyard silent now.

Someone barks out a shocked giggle out that gets muffled just as fast as it was let out. Vile twitches from the floor.

“If this room isn’t empty in ten seconds, everyone here is dead,” Vile growls, a deadly sound that sends klaxons blaring in every reploid’s head.

Every person save for X start emergency evacuating and by the time Vile fully stands up, the last reploid has rushed out of the door. 

“I said _everyone,_ X. Unless you have a death wish?”

“I’m not afraid of you, Vile.” X pauses. “Also, it’s hard to be afraid of someone covered in tomato sauce.”

“ _You son of a –_ “

X sighs. “I said I’m going to clean up my mess and I’m not backing out of it. Stay still, please.”

Before Vile can rip X’s arm and beat the android up with it, X takes out a napkin and starts dabbing Vile’s helmet, wiping away the sauce and the violet reploid is stock frozen. A part of him is vehemently asking him why he’s just standing there and not shooting X at point blank fire with his cannon, but Vile can’t find himself to move. The bizarre spark that’s been going haywire inside of him is in this weird binary state, on and off and none at all, and the default is to not do anything until he figures out what the rust is going on with his systems.

“You made this mess in the first place. I owe you nothing,” Vile blurts out glaring. The effect is ruined by the fact that he’s wearing his helmet.

X hums, still cleaning. “I know.”

“B-Class asshole, you being the First means nothing,” the warbot continues poisonously. “You’re no one’s creator. Father of All Reploids my metal ass, all you did was lie down and get opened up by a bunch of humans. You didn’t do anything. You _can’t_ do anything. You’re weak and you’re no better than the next reploid.”

X stops mid-motion. Then he bows his head, his eyes hiding under the deep V of his helmet. Vile smirks.

_Take that._

The warmachine expects anger. He expects X’s legendary patience to finally brittle and snap, for that mouth to open wide and start screaming, those green eyes to be engulfed in rage, to be watery in either frustration or hurt whatever. Just have some real fucking emotion that’s not detached politeness, low-key disapproval or priestly calm that X has been doing so far towards Vile, pretending he’s above it all when he called Vile a jackass behind his back.

Time for the blue android to show he’s just insignificant as the rest.

X’s shoulders start trembling. Then a little sound peeks out.

When X raises his head, Vile can’t look away.

“Not better than the next reploid, huh?” X says with flushed cheeks and a wide smile. “I know.”

Vile stares. Then stares some more.

Suddenly the warbot seizes X’s raised wrist, fingers digging into the azure armor so hard that X hisses aloud, reactively bringing his other hand to Vile’s to pry him away. The warmachine only holds on tighter, tugging X a little closer because Vile wants to, wants to…

Wants to what?

“Vile?” X whispers cautiously.

Vile blinks.

What is he doing?

Vile mechanically whacks X’s head and leaves the canteen and a befuddled X.  

 

* * *

 

“Wait, X _threw_ it at Vile? You screwing with me?”

“No, I was there! Vile was trying to explain some human thing and X flipped out! It was bolts!”

“Let’s be real, it’s _Vile_. It was probably his fault.”

“Not this time. X started it first. Smelt me, I never saw X like that before.”

Wow, despite humiliating himself in front of a bunch of Made-In-UEA, fifty zenny low-grade nobodies, Vile is overall satisfied with this development.

X curses and loses his temper like any average reploid. It’s about time people outside of Vile rusting figure that out. It won’t be long until the rest of the Hunters realize that the Father of All Reploids isn’t smarter, wiser, or better than any one of them.

 _How does it feel showing everyone what a sham you really are, First_? Vile thinks smugly.

Later, in front of Vile’s private quarters (a well-deserved, A-Rank privilege), there’s an innocuous toolbox wrapped in plastic with a large bowtie on the handle.

Inside the box is some unknown, homemade chemical mix in a bottle, a couple free entry tickets to a Gina Gunner’s Oil Bath Sauna – “Relaxation for all Reploids!”, a small jug of WD-40, a protective case of a tiny, specific but essential replacement joint cogs, and some highly pure energen.  

On the top is a written piece of card with a picture of a ridiculous teary-eyed cartoon hedgehog with the words “I’m sorry” printed across it.

The card says:

_“Dear Vile, again I’m sorry for my behavior at the canteen. I was immature and you suffered the consequences of my childishness. I hope you find this gift basket to your liking. Sincerely, X._

_P.S. The clear liquid bottle is an odor-remover in case the spaghetti smell hasn’t come off from your helmet.”_

Vile’s core thrums strangely right up until the last sentence. He unceremoniously dumps the whole thing in his trash bin.

After taking everything useful inside of it out.

Later there’s a carelessly opened envelope taped on one of the various B-Rank rooms, signed for X.

Inside is a piece of plain paper with the words, “ _Fuck you, my helmet smells fantastic like always._ ”

It’s signed by no one. It doesn’t need to be.

 

* * *

 

Despite having his own private quarters, it’s habitual for Vile to walk to the Hunter Common Room despite it becoming a pathetic joke. This time he sees Storm Eagle acting dealer for a card game that the other Seventh Unit members are playing on the ground in a corner. Spark Mandrill is laying on the ground at the other corner, staring at the ceiling probably thinking of something imbecilic like the meaning of life. They’re all hogging up the wide space at the very back of the room. 

But the real treat is a solitary X sitting tidily on the center of one of the many long couches, scrolling something in his new data pad.

Vile marches in front of X, covering the other android in his shadow.

X glances up. Carefully, he says, “Hello Vile. Can I help you with anything?”

Vile still wants to tear out X’s power distributors and lay them under the sun so that’s still there. The last time they saw each other it was a weird moment, but Vile’s determined to forget it and it seems X has his healthy wariness of the violet warbot back. Vile can hear a low revving of combat mode kicking in from the blue android. X is prepared for violence and he’s getting ready to dodge it.

Then it dawns to Vile that he’s become _predictable_.

Gotta change it up then.  

“You’re in my seat,” Vile says dully. “Move.”

X’s combat mode goes quieter but it’s not completely disengaged. With a raised eyebrow, X scoots accommodatingly down on the couch, unfazed.

After detaching his shoulder cannon and ammunition belt against the side of the couch, the purple combatdroid plops down on the spot where X once was.

Then he twists his midriff and lays down. His violet helmet smacks harshly against X’s arms, forcing the B-Hunter to drop his data pad. As the tablet clatters against the ground, Vile shimmies his head on X’s lap.

X’s reaction is priceless. The Father of All Reploid’s expression is crossed between confused, irritated, and surprised, and his mouth opens and closes a couple times like a broken mech.

_Didn’t expect this, did you?_

“Vile, what are you doing?” the blue android manages. He’s so hilariously still a dumb pigeon can come and take a crap on him.

“Hmm?” Vile says lazily. “Is that really you, X?”

X wrinkles his nose. “What are you talking about? You just addressed me by name a minute ago - ”

“You’re just such a fucking softie I thought you were a pillow for a minute.”

X’s hands hover in the air, fingers fractionally curled, as if he doesn’t know what to do with them.

 _I dare you to try shoving me off, you stupid pacifist_ , Vile thinks viciously, not budging a centimeter.

“Hey, what’s going on here?” says Storm Eagle arriving from the back. The Airborne Unit Leader scans the scene and raises his hands on his waist authoritatively. “X, is Vile bothering you?”

Instead of growling at the nosy, smug feathery scrap bucket, the purple warbot laughs at his beak. “Yeesh, need to get your eyes checked, Eagle? Look at us! Me and X here are just two pals chumming it up.” Then Vile says to X, “Unless I _am_ bothering you, X?”

“What? Of course not,” X blurts, eyes wide, and Vile smirks.

_Cornered, bitch._

“Alright, but if Vile is giving you trouble, let me know, X,” Storm Eagle says as if he can do anything.

“Oh screw off. This ain’t none of your business,” Vile quips, raising a middle finger. “Hey, did you know the humans call this ‘flipping the bird?’ And you’re a bird animaloid? Get it?”

Storm Eagle shakes his head while Vile cackles at his turned back.

“What are you trying to do, Vile?” X whispers. “What do you want?”

Vile sits up and brings his helm extremely close to the other android’s. “Why? You _do_ have a problem with me?”

“I want to understand you,” is the immediate reply. “I don’t want to be your enemy but you’ve been belligerent towards me ever since we’ve met. The few times you act civil they seem shallow. What are you up to this time?”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Vile goads. “I’m just trying to be friends with you now. Didn’t you want to be friends with me?”

“I…I do.”

“Then put a cog on it pillow, I’m taking a nap,” says Vile as he lays back on X’s thighs again.

X’s gaze goes to the side, face flushed crimson and Vile counts it as a victory. To be that red, X must be embarrassed. Irritated. Incensed. So rubbed acid he might as well have been dunk in a vat of it.

Vile takes a photo. This time it’s voluntary like it’s supposed to be.

For the next ten minutes Vile watches X’s pinched face from below, enjoying how the blue android above him squirm in place.

At one point, X stops looking uncomfortable and starts appearing inquisitive.

Then the blue android makes chit-chat.

“I’ve never met a reploid who curses like a human as much as you do,” he notes.

“Didn’t I tell you to shut up?”

“I know you’re not napping. You’re a combat based reploid, Vile.”

“And what’s that supposed to mean?”

“Generally, combatdroids can’t sleep anywhere unless they’re in a recharge tube, in complete isolation, or they’re so low on power they go into forced sleep mode. It’s a programming as strong as human instinct.”

“Human this, human that. Why do you care so much about those fleshbags so much?”

“Are you avoiding the question?”

“I’m not avoiding anything.” Then Vile remembers to add,” fuck you.”

“There it is again.”

“You know a lot of human cursing too,” Vile remarks casually. “And you know what it means too. Who knew that goody two-pedes X knows what fucking means?”

X visibly grimaces. “Vile.”

“You even had to throw human food at me so you can protect a bunch of newlybuilts’ innocence. How responsible.”

Green eyes sharpen. “Reploid innocence relating to sex? Now that’s an interesting concept. The way you word it, it almost seems you’re…”

“I’m what?”

The smaller android shakes his head. “Anyways, I can ask that same question back to you. You know things that most reploids aren’t familiar with as well.”

 _I used to be surrounded by humans. Only humans. That’s how I know,_ Vile doesn’t say.

Overall, Vile can care less about following Sigma’s orders, but there are conditions for Vile to stay with the Hunters. His backgrounds are meant to be confidential. At least Zero had the benefit of being discovered in the middle of rustville nowhere with no records to trace from. If certain people know how many levels of illegal Vile’s existence is, he’s automatically a Maverick for functioning.

It sucks that he’s not allowed to tell anyone what he really is - what makes _him_ leagues above anyone else - and bolts, keeping it under wraps is annoying especially since it gives so many Hunters the false impression that they can ever get onto his level.

He almost wants to tell it to X. To drive in the point that if X is special, then so is Vile. And if Vile isn’t, then X isn’t either. 

Except Vile is starting to think that X is well aware of that. It’s the rest of the world who hasn’t caught up yet.

_When he’s not being a nagging pissbucket, he’s not bad._

Wait- no! X is still a weak B-Class who doesn’t belong in the Hunters. In fact he’s poisoning them, softening them up – he even mucked up with the way Vile used to handle Mavericks! Now because of him he can’t just wreck them.

Levels of resentment rising again. Good. That’s how it should be.

An idea strikes Vile and he chuckles meaningfully. ”Oh, I know _plenty_ of things that other reploids don’t. Got parts they don’t have either.”

Deliberately Vile turns his helmet’s direction towards X’s belly, rubbing into it. For some reason Vile expects X to blush and stammer, like an indignant old human, but instead the smaller android leans down, one end of his lips twitching upwards.

“Nice try, Vile. I’m the reploid template. Where do you think your parts are based from?”

The warmachine will never admit that he’s grateful for Command Center summoning the Elite Unit right then.  

 

* * *

 

It’s as natural as coding for Vile to subvert established structures. Society likes to stack up these cute systems, lay them over and over like bricks, and it’s fun to knock them down like a tower of cards. Show people how shallow their routine is and keep their sensors bright.

It has to be some misplaced affection for unavailable designers that have rookies and younger reploids (who compare to X is every reploid, ugh) to flock towards X as if the Father of All Reploids is actually their father when it’s really a lame, overdramatic title the humans gave X for the sake of selling headlines. They’re eager to please and hang on X’s word like he’s dropping some holy wisdom even when he’s saying something as mundane as wanting to go walk at a park. They might as well be ready to lay shock absorbers beneath X’s feet in case the blue android ever trips. It’s really pathetic.

By virtue of being the First, X has spawned a social structure that puts himself on top.

It makes Vile sick.   

So Vile starts lying on X in the common room.

Since technically Vile is doing nothing wrong, X doesn’t do anything about it under some guise of trying to be amenable.

One downside is that the B-Hunter keeps talking off Vile’s aural cones and if the warmachine doesn’t reply then X persists like the annoying rustshit he is. 

“Did you choose your colors?”

“My what?”

“Your colors. The purple and the gold.”

“Why would I give a ru – crap about my paintjob? I was built like this.”

“Your designer must have had high ambitions for you then.”

“Huh?”

“Purple and gold are colors typically associated with royalty. Long time ago the most expensive dye color was purple and only the elite could afford it. Even though purple fabric and gold aren’t as rare and valuable as they used to be, the symbolism remains.”

“Huh. So why the fuck are you so blue?”

An enigmatic smile. “I’m not so sure. For remembrance I think.”

Vile admits, albeit reluctantly, that X can be interesting sometimes. The First talks about things everyone else doesn’t.  

But when it comes down to it, Vile’s doing this to see the other Hunters’ expressions. The faces they make when they walk in on Vile using X as a glorified pillow rest is worth it.

Well. The other Hunters’ range from awkward to confused to “whatever.” Only Zero’s reaction is worth it because the red warbot knows what it actually means.

“This is out of character for you,” the blond warbot comments with narrowed eyes.

“You don’t know me. Go jump in acid,” replies Vile automatically, wearing a shit-eating grin underneath his helm. He doesn’t even lift his head from X’s lap.

Trying to be the dignified one, X says,” Vile and I are friends now. This is what Vile does with his friends.”

“Degrading you into an object of convenience is friend-behavior?” Zero asks crossing his arms.

X’s eyes widen. “That’s not – “  

“Sure it is!” Vile cuts in.

“He’s joking, Zero,” X insists swiftly.

“I’m not joking.” The funny thing is that he’s not.

“There are multiple psychological evaluations of an increase in positive emotions among humans when they touch each other albeit the experience is highly dependent by the social evaluation of the person touching them,” the blue android says in a speed that edges on defensive. “Though robots don’t innately carry the instinct to seek out physical affection, I’m testing to see if the associations may develop to something similar.”

Vile pauses.

He promptly sits up, forcing X to back further in his seat to avoid colliding against the warmachine’s head.

“You’ve been using me as some test subject based on human behavior?!” Vile rages. He doesn’t care that he’s making a scene.

X blink owlishly. “Not entirely, but I won’t deny that I was curious...“

“Fuck you! You don’t get to use me as something convenient! That’s supposed to be you!”

“So you’re using X to climb,” Zero muses disapprovingly. “Using his kindness and ignorance to your advantage and expanding your social territory. I’d do the same if I was you.”

“And fuck you too!” Vile stands up and jabs a finger at the crimson warbot’s chest. “I don’t need to climb anything! You think I give a shit about the Hunters or anyone else? I don’t _need_ anyone!”

“I’m lost. ‘Climb?’ ‘Territory?’ Can someone tell me why lying on my lap is suddenly a big deal?” X speaks up, exasperated.

Zero shifts attention to X, looking vaguely frustrated. “It’s not just the lap. He’s been doing this for a long time. I just haven’t realized it until now.”

“I still don’t understand what you mean, Zero.”

Zero points at Vile. “Elizabeth.” He points at X. “Darcy.”

At X’s wide eyes, the violet warmachine snaps at both robots, “I don’t know what you’re talking about, but shut up!”

“Combatdroid programming,” X whispers meaningfully. He’s so quiet that aural senses have to be elevated to pick his voice up. “Oh. Ohhhhh.”

Vile doesn’t entirely understand what’s going on either but X is looking at him as if he’s viewing the violet warmachine in a new light. He has no idea what X is thinking about, less alone understanding, but something about “X” and “understanding” together in the same sentence is crossing wires in Vile. That stupid current is back but this time it’s plugged into a Tesla coil and rust – _fuck_ this, why the smelt is he dealing with this bullshit again?

“If you were a Maverick, you’d be offlined right now,” Vile snarls before stomping off. At least he’s not banned from the sim gym.

It’s not the same as blowing a mech up, torn circuitry and all, but it’s all he’s got right now.

 

* * *

 

Vile’s not a coward. He just hates X so much he can’t stand looking at him without wanting to empty a full ammunition belt into the B-Hunter’s face so really Vile is letting him off easy. Honestly, the Hunters should be grateful that Vile isn’t deliberately riling up their precious First anymore. He doesn’t even go to the Hunters Common Room anymore to decrease the risk of immediately setting the entire place on fire. He’s so damn gracious.

Also the sparring ban has expired so Vile’s favorite pastime is back.

Since the ban was caused by being “too extreme,” the warmachine throws the figurative E-Tank at his opponents and doesn’t use his weapons. These lucky fools don’t get how much Vile is sacrificing to let them live.  

But leave it to X to screw with Vile _again._ He almost forgot that it’s in the B-Hunter’s personality to step into other people’s business unwarranted.

Vile is about to kick his opponent’s head off the sparring floor when he senses movement falling down from above him. A nanosecond later, a blue blur dashes across his vision and suddenly the space in front of the purple warbot is empty.

“What the hell, X!” Vile shouts when his gaze catches up to X and the rescued reploid at the side. He was actually having a half-decent good time kicking the magenta reploid a thousand different ways till Sunday and seeing X off-duty has Vile shouting, “Get back on the balcony. It’s a one v. one - move out of the way!”

What’s this asshole doing here anyway?

“He can’t fight anymore,” X responds sternly, hands still on the magenta reploid’s upper arms protectively after he rolled them away.

“I didn’t hear him say ‘yield.’ Or did you forget what the sparring rules are already, you antique?” Vile sneers.

“He _can’t_ say anything – you broke his vocal unit!”

As if on cue, the Hunter coughs out static.

Vile scoffs. “He’s intact isn’t he? And if he wasn’t so dumb he wouldn’t ask me to a spar. He deserved to get thrashed.”

“A spar is supposed to be a lesson,” retorts X coolly. “It’s training. What you did was way too far!”

“Everything is ‘too far’ with you. Yeesh, how are the Hunters going to get anything done with you babysitting everyone? Way to lead the reploid evolution, X!”

X stands up with the rookie, guiding the younger reploid in shaky steps closer towards the entrance. “I’m taking him to Medbay. This match is over.”

“Says who? Who offlined and made you Commander!” Vile shouts stomping over. Even when the purple war machine gets close to X’s face, violet helmet touching azure, X stays still, face blank save for a set of hard eyes and a small line for lips.

At the sounds of murmuring above him, Vile lifts his head at the spectator stands on the ringed second floor. “What, you’ve got something to say to me too, you floppy discs?”

The small group of low-ranking Hunters shut up instantly, cowed.

“That’s what I thought!” Vile sneers before resuming his attention back to X again. “Get off your pedestal, First. You’re still a smelting B-Class who can’t last five minutes in a fight without someone saving you.”

“What happened to being friends, Vile?”

“Why the fuck would I want to be friends with a weak, arrogant stuck-up like you?”

The blue android groans. He readjusts his hold on the reploid in his arms to release one hand, rubbing his nose bridge.

“Just when I thought we were getting somewhere…that’s it. I’ve been doing this wrong the whole time. I have to meet you halfway.”

Vile snaps, “What are you talking about?”

“Let’s spar, Vile.”

The violet warmachine gapes beneath his helmet. _X_ issuing a challenge?

While Vile is conducting a diagnostics check to see his processor isn’t malfunctioning, X calls up to the balcony, “Can someone please take Mac back to the Medbay?”

“Not me,” a Hunter admits openly. “I want to watch this.”

“I want to watch too!”

Galvanized, Vile aims his right arm at the balcony, fist dipped low for the muzzle tucked underneath his forearm to cock up. “If you crap tanks don’t take this idiot and leave, I’m terminating all of you.”

“No way, you can’t – “

Vile angles his aim to the far side, releasing a rapid fire stream of shots that chases the yelping Hunters to the other end of the balcony in panic. 

“Rule number one: never tell me what I can and can’t do,” Vile hisses as he marches to X, tear the hapless reploid in his arms, provoking an offended gasp from the blue android, and swings the body up to the second floor like a sack of parts. “Do you want me to get my cannon? Now _scram_.”

“Mac was injured!” X fumes as the remaining Hunters rush out to leave. “Would it hurt you to have some basic decency?”

“Weapons, no time limit,” Vile intones.

“What?”

He can’t wait any longer.

Without warning Vile charges forward and drives a furious punch right into X’s chest where the other’s core should be and X exvents before he’s flying. Before the current has always been sitting somewhere in the base of Vile’s abdomen but now it’s gone straight into his processor and Vile can’t hold back the manic sound that leaves his mouth, echoing through the sparring room and blanketing the two floors with its sound. Maybe it’s because this time X is putting up a better fight – quickly recovering and regaining his footing, twisting away from Vile’s next punch, dashing away from a sharp kick – that Vile feels like all his power distributors are set alight. X is worthier prey now.

X instantly transforms his arm into a buster, firing a low powered shot but Vile hops over it, scoffing as the pathetic yellow fire zips by. Before he lands, the warmachine activates his thrusters in large bursts midair twice, flipping in a clean arc over X’s form, a napalm slipping out from the inconspicuous slot in his ankle.

X reflexively knocks the small bomb and he explodes upon impact against a wall.

“Vile, energy weapons dialed low and no explosives!” X cries. “Do you want to get banned again?”

Vile responds with aiming his shoulder cannon and a shadowed grin.

X deadpans, “Why are you like this.”

But instead of fleeing, X raises his buster, face set in determined lines, and soon the sparring floor flashes in bright greens and blues. The room becomes engulfed in a thick blanket of pale smoke and burning air.

A sound that undeniably sounds like something charging rises audibly and the same green light reaches for the ceiling, the smoke clearing out from the sheer force.

Pieces of metal rain down around X, whose arm is raised straight towards the sky, viridian eyes piercing, like lasers.

“I didn’t want the smoke alarm and the sprinklers to turn on,” the blue android explains as his arm swings down. “I prefer we don’t get interrupted.”  

It takes a second for Vile to understand what just happened. “That was a charged shot,” he says blankly.

When the hell did X upgrade his weaponry? Vile hasn’t seen X go to either Medbay or a repair shop, or did he go back to the lab he crawled out from while Vile wasn’t looking? What the fuck, _what the fuck,_ Vile doesn’t pay attention for one minute and X is already -

With an all-suffering sigh, X says, “Vile, how do you feel towards me?”

“Hah?” What’s X on about now? “I want to kill you.”

“And _why_ do you want to kill me?” X asks sounding exhausted.

“Isn’t it obvious? I fucking hate you.” To the point that every time he sees X he wants to level an entire city block. Even right now he wants to pollute the ocean with a thousand tons of oil and drop a match on it. “Is your processor malfunctioning? How do you not get this already?”

“So if someone else kills me it would be okay?”

There’s something about X that captures Vile’s undisputed attention. It’s the same thing from before, when Vile tried to corner him but the blue android persists to keep going forward, closing a distance and yet it’s different too.

X is wearing a face as if Vile is the only thing the other android sees. The current is too much and Vile is stuck where he is.

“Let’s say I’m in a fight with a Maverick and I’m at my breaking point. I’m helpless and I have no back-up. It wouldn’t bother you at all that I die to them?”

For a moment Vile pictures it. If he felt like vaporizing the ocean before, now he wants to vaporize the entire world. Everything is blue then _red_.  

“And what if Zero was the Maverick?” X tilts his head. “He used to be one. What if he goes berserk again? He’s my friend and he’s strong. If he stabs me in the back with a beam saber, I wouldn’t see it coming.”

Vile strikes out with two claw-like hands, one that seizes X by his buster arm and other at his throat. 

“NO ONE ELSE CAN KILL YOU - _YOU’RE MINE!”_

There was a stretch of silence while those words sink in.

“To kill,” Vile tacks in the end dumbly as he lets go. “You’re mine to kill. My kill.”

Except Vile doesn’t feel like killing X anymore. Instead he feels like he shot down a streetlight and it fell on him.

_What the hell…?_

The blue android faces the ceiling, eyes closed, as if asking for patience from the cosmos. “You’re cruel. You’re violent, sadistic, and spiteful. You’re an unapologetically horrible person -”

Vile snaps back to the present and crosses his arms. Yeah he knows all this. What’s new?

“- immature, petty, jealous and sometimes incredibly _stupid_ sometimes – “

“Hey, want to run last part to my face one more time?” Vile growls down at the smaller android.

X lifts his head. He rises up and Vile has a faceful of bright green eyes through the T of his helmet.

“You’re the opposite of a good decision, but I like you anyway,” X smiles before laying his lips softly on Vile’s helmet.

Vile freezes.

Devastating bombs have a pattern; upon detonation it releases a blast wave: the increased pressure and flow resulting from the deposition of a large amount of energy in a small, very localized volume. The force then sucks everything within its vicinity into the center, and then huffs it out with a powerful wind of negative pressure.

The words are the explosion. The vacuum is the current silence that descends in the sparring room.

The resulting blast wind is Vile’s higher cognitive systems shutting down, sweeping all forefront processing thoughts away and the last thing he hears before hyper-info absorption takes him away is X calling out his name.

Maverick Hunter A-Rank Vile enters forced recharge standing up.

 

* * *

 

Reploids don’t come into the world completely blind. Subroutines, base data archives, programming, directives, understanding of basic parameters – all of that comes online the moment they’re activated.

When VAVA.04 was first activated he remembers having absolutely nothing but an understanding of his capacity: nine different weapon systems, each of them specifically designed to maximize the amount of destruction its kind can achieve, and plenty of knowledge on how to use them. Then he felt his overworking ventilations, churning grit and dust along with the awareness of a never-ending wasteland and a pinking sky.

 _Then_ he registered the nine other thoroughly wrecked reploids lying around him and an impressed whistle.

So when Vile surfaces from forced sleep, the first thing he does is punch the space in front of him and shoot Vulcans at a tiled ceiling, barely missing a fluorescent light.

“...Good morning to you too."

Weapons: All online. Diagnostics check: all green. The time: 03:46 AM. Notifications: None.

Vile turns to the side and sees X sitting in a chair, setting a turned off data pad on a desk next to him. 

“I brought you to Medbay. Private recovery room at the end,” the blue android explains to an unspoken question. He stands up and walks closer to the warmachine lying against an examination slab. “I didn’t want to leave you in the sparring room.”

The B-Hunter bends low, resting his forearms at the edge of Vile’s bed. “How are you feeling?”

“I don’t hate you,” Vile says in soft awe.

“Oh. I was asking about your physical state, but I’m glad to hear that too.”

“I don’t hate you,” the purple reploid repeats, putting a hand on his head. “This entire time I…”

_Wanted you._

Vile doesn’t dare completing that sentence aloud. Instead he raises his head and hits it back against the slab, punctuating every statement with a thunk.

“Rust. Me. What. Do I do. With. This smelting. Knowledge.”

X sticks his arm out beneath Vile’s head before he hits it anymore. “Please stop.”

“Don’t tell me what to do,” the warmachine snaps half-heartedly. He stops anyway.

“So…what do you want to do?”

X doesn’t need to see Vile’s eyes to know that he’s being asked a question. He shrugs. “You said ‘what do I do?’ Well, what do you _want_ to do?”

_What do I want?_

Vile sits up, body more fully turned towards the standing android.

The warmachine leans forward, gaze level matching X’s, not out of some intimidation tactic. This time he’s really studying him because he needs to understand what the rust this – this stupid blue _thing_ is because how did he do it? How did X figure out that Vile wanted him before Vile figure it out himself? Is it the benefit of being the oldest robot?

After all X made the first move.

“You kissed me.”

“…Yes. I’m surprised you know what that is. Rust.” He rubs the back of his neck, awkward. “Should have guessed. You know an awful lot of things other reploids don’t.”

He’s grown bright red, embarrassed, biting his lips and it’s a good look on him. Retrospectively, every X look was a good look.  

The next thing Vile knows, he’s flipping X so that it’s the blue android lying on the examination slab, staring up to the warmachine pinning him down. He wryly notes that his camera has gone off again (Damn, the automatic picture-taking makes a lot of sense now).

 _What do you want to do?_ X’s voice echoes.

“I want to kill you,” Vile answers fervently, tightening his hold on X’s wrists with his own. On edge. “I want your death. I want that to be mine.”

Because overall Vile’s not an idiot despite severely underdeveloped in self-understanding but who the fuck has their existence figured out anyway? Fucking no one, that’s who. Vile knows that X being the rusting, worrying, “I became a Hunter to understand why Maverickism is happening,” leaking-core dumbass he is, X won’t give his everything to Vile. If Vile wants all of X, it’s either death or force. 

But force is pathetic in a different angle and Vile isn’t _that_ desperate so X better smelting give him something here.   

“Um, I don’t want to give my death to you. I…we can be friends though I have a feeling that’s not enough.”

“You’re friends with everybody. That’s nothing special.” It’s not enough.

“And I don’t kiss my friends either.” X smiles. “You’re already special, Vile.”

Kissing.

Vile distantly remembers the dancers and what the clients did to them after the performance ended. He never understood why the warlords paid so much zenny for the younger ones. When he asked, they told him it’s because they’re untouched. They get to be the first to take them.

“Has anyone fucked you?” he blurts out bluntly.

X blinks then snorts. “Is that supposed to be a proposition? I thought if I was going to have my first time, it wouldn’t be so – “

“So you haven’t,” Vile interrupts excitedly.

Being the first one. The first. There’s always something special of being First.

He doesn’t need to kill X to keep something of him that no one else can have. He can keep something else.

“You know I haven’t agreed to anything, right?”

Vile’s wearing a helmet so there’s no way X can see his expression, but Vile must be radiating like a volcano because X’s expression wavers between annoyed and exasperation before settling into amusement. "Let me go, you ridiculous reploid. I can’t touch you like this.”  

“…Give me a moment.”

Vile lets X’s wrists go to sit back on his knees.

With one hand on his forehead and the other on the back of his helmet, Vile digs into the nigh invisible clasps where the gunmetal grey meets the purple and unlocks them. A slight twist and they split neatly apart around his aural cones and clack against the ground.

He hasn’t done this before he joined the Hunters, thought he would never do this ever again, but he didn’t think he’d not-hate anyone either.

His vision expands. The world is wider and brighter. At the center of it all is X with eyes so wide they’re bulging out underneath the V of his helmet.

Vile is aware of how he looks: dark synthetic robot hair, infrared LED lights for crimson eyes and unrepaired, ignored slices all over his faux-skin. He’s a rustdamn mess.

X scoots up to have enough space to sit up, lower body still trapped underneath Vile’s. He raises a gentle finger and grazes over a severe cut on Vile’s right cheek. “What happened to you?” the smaller android asks.

The sympathy burns. Vile grumbles, “None of your rusting business.”

He grabs the back of X’s head and smashes their faces together,

Like every reploid, Vile has parameters but he’s always pushing against them. For example, it’s a safety limit that he doesn’t utilize more than three weapon systems at the same time or it’ll strain him. He can’t shoot his cannon multiple times in a row, but long ago Vile did it once out of curiosity and it felt like his systems were going haywire, his processor fading away. The white light upon explosion.

Touching X beneath all his layers feels like that, maybe even more so.

Underneath X’s helmet is short brown hair that’s easy to pull back every time X feels a little too far. Vile never liked that distance between them, metaphorically and now physically.

“You like that?” Vile mouths in X’s neck, mindlessly repeating words heard long ago beyond thin walls and dirty fabric hanging over door-less entrances that he didn’t quite understand until now.

It’s hard to follow the current’s speed, to go faster when X is trying to deliberately slow this down. He pulls Vile up so he can kiss every cut on the warmachine’s face, sneaks a tongue into his mouth when he get there. Lazy and languid, he’s taking his sweet time but Vile can’t let him go slow because if he lets X go slow, X starts thinking. And when X starts thinking he starts asking questions.

“Vile, where - where did you learn…?”

Shut up shut up _shut up._

“So damn slow,” Vile hisses, an excuse to not answer anything as he flips the smaller android around, the movement rocking the examination table beneath them as X goes on all fours.

Vile has only memories that don’t even belong to him to work with, and even then they’re totally useless because X’s body beneath his armor is nothing like a human’s. He’s all blues and darks, circuitry lining stitching light metal and mesh and the warmachine doesn’t know if rubbing them does anything for X. So Vile is begrudgingly grateful that X is an emotionally open robot because then Vile gets to hear a broken gasp here, a whimper there, and then Vile’s not so bumbling lost anymore.

It’s literally a rusting test of patience when Vile’s fingers are rubbing against the inner walls of smaller android’s entrance, all smoldering heat and temptation. When X starts bucking back into his administrations, Vile pulls back, barely missing the whine below him. He grasps X’s hips and carefully lines up, pressing insistently against the smaller android.

“You want this, huh? You _wan_ t this,” Vile rumbles. It’s supposed to sound taunting but it comes out like pleading for a confirmation instead.  

Not that X notices – he’s flushed red and gasping, bright green eyes glazed as if his processor’s shut down, but he manages a shaky nod anyway. Vile releases an exvent he didn’t know he was carrying and starts sliding slowly.

“More,” X moans out when Vile goes still. Vile was only trying to adjust to this molten tightness, literally a second away from pounding in with everything he has - so seriously, _fuck_ X for telling Vile to keep going because now out of principle Vile _has_ to draw this out. Vile doesn’t do what other people want or expect -  _that’s just what he does._

The taller android strengthens his grip, locks X in place and _grinds_.

“Beg me if you want more,” Vile leers through X’s frustrated groans and over his own barely restrained need.

“Rust, _Vile_ ,” the blue android glares at Vile over his own shoulder. “I _want_ this so will you _please_  move?”

“Come on, you rusting beta, you can do better than that. Be cuter. Tell me how badly you need me. You talk way too much to be shy so don’t fucking pretend you are.”

X has been complying obediently to Vile up to this point so the warmachine doesn’t see the other android move time to properly react. X quickly smacks Vile’s vice-like hold off his waist, surges up and push the tall reploid so it’s Vile lying on their unconventional bed.

“You want me to talk? I’ll talk,” X murmurs and Vile can’t rouse any anger when X looks so good like this, expressing desire with his entire body as he takes in Vile again, greedily seizing what he wants. X bounces up and down, setting his pace and building a steady, delicious rhythm that has Vile reaching for more while X spills truths with harsh moans.

“You make me so rusting angry and sad and embarrassed and so, _so_ happy – nothing is easy with you but you make me feel _alive_. I – “ Another pleasured cry. “I d-don’t need to take the higher road and be an - an example around you. I don’t need to be mega – “

X is growing erratic with his movements and Vile is gritting his teeth, wildly thrusting upwards. Vile’s chest feels so full but his entire construction feels light, like gravity has reversed and he’s falling into the sky, falling into blue and into X -

So this is self-destruction. Exploding, imploding - both and then nothing at all.

 

* * *

 

“2,449,490 zennies worth of property damage – specifically, Maverick Hunters property damage,” Sigma ticks off witheringly. “And one heavily injured reploid. Again. Vile, I rather have a competent Hunter that can follow rules than a destructively powerful one. You’re not irreplaceable.”

“The damage to the sparring room isn’t Vile’s, sir,” X speaks up before Vile can. “It’s mine. I didn’t properly aim and regulate my buster charge.”

“As admirable it is that you’re being honest with me, X, I still have a decommissioned Hunter needing a voicebox replacement. Vile, you’re banned from the sparring room again _and_ you’re on probation.”

“ _Just_ probation?”

Sigma raises a featureless eyebrow, suspicious. “You’re taking this better than I expected.”

Vile shrugs. “Not gonna lie, if this happened to me last week I’d get so bored I’d bomb this dump. But I think I’ve got something to do to pass the time.”

“You found a hobby? Enlighten me.”

The warmachine cackles, his helmet shaking in mirth. “Sure, if you think lifting X’s legs and bending him backwards is – ACH!”

 Below Sigma’s desk, X is digging his foot on top of Vile’s after a particularly hard stomp.

“I’ll pay for the damages and for Mac’s replacement voicebox as well,” X remarks kindly while Vile is muttering curses under his breath. “If everything is done here, permission to leave, sir?”

“…Permission granted.”

Standing up, X bows his head lightly in respect towards the Commander then grabs Vile’s wrist, stalking towards the door.

“Fucking eat acid, X! What did you do that for?”

“Why do you have to be so vulgar?”

“Hah! You weren’t complaining about me being vulgar last ni – OW! Shit, I’m going to _kill_ you!”

Then the door slides open and slides close behind them.

Sigma stares at the door a bit longer, shakes his head, and goes back to sending repair orders and rush order payments to the cleanup-crew.

A part of the Maverick Hunters Commander knows that if Vile isn’t particularly upset about his punishment, it’s not really a punishment and should be adjusted accordingly.

But another part of him is quick to point out that this new, strange Vile would have never let another person hit him without retaliating with a fury of a thousand suns.

That’s almost enough to call off the probation and give Vile a pay-raise instead.

**Author's Note:**

> This story was not supposed to be this long OTL  
> I'd like to say that Vile's hinted backstory is not canon. It's something I made out of when I learned that his Japanese name, VAVA, is actually based on a character from Mad Max. God, I made up an entire origin story for this dude to help move the story to where it needed to be but jfc, it's not pretty. 
> 
> PS. Want to kick my ass or talk fic stuff? Message me at my twitter or tumblr aka JanitorBot.


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